NASA Awards Cargo Contracts

There was some good news this week regarding cargo transportation to the International Space Station after the Space Shuttles are retired in 2010.

Orbital Sciences Corp. and Space Exploration Technologies - SpaceX - today won NASA contracts valued at up to $1.9 billion and $1.6 billion respectively for 20 unmanned space station cargo flights to deliver experiment hardware, crew supplies and replacement components after the space shuttle is retired.

This will greatly reduce our need to rely on Russian or European transports to send our supply obligations up to the ISS. And, if SpaceX is successful with their DragonX manned capability, we may also be able to avoid using any non-US transport for crew rotations as well. This is wonderful news.